


How He Leaves

by Sandtalon



Category: Moominvalley (Cartoon 2019), Mumintroll | Moomins Series - Tove Jansson, 楽しいムーミン一家 | Moomin (Anime 1990)
Genre: Adventure, Fluff, Gen, One Shot, Short & Sweet, Travel, discovering little my is fireproof through an accident, idk what to tell you lads thats it thats the fic, literally just moomin thinking abt having an adventure
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2020-12-26
Packaged: 2021-03-10 21:08:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,124
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28333617
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sandtalon/pseuds/Sandtalon
Summary: Moominvalley is a marvelous place to live.Early birds sing to worms churning through rich soil that gives way to new green shoots and old tree roots. There’s something in the hazy morning skies and crisp clean afternoon breeze that whispers about all the adventures that await around the riverbend.Very few places make Moomin nostalgic for a place he’s never known.So maybe it’s inevitable.There’s only so long one can live amongst tales of travel and adventure without wanting one for himself.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 10





	How He Leaves

**Author's Note:**

> heLLO LOVELY PEOPLE. Here's a one shot. happy holidays. cheers to the new year.
> 
> also i know the pov switches entirely too much, srry abt that

Moominvalley is a marvelous place to live.

Early birds sing to worms churning through rich soil that gives way to new green shoots and old tree roots. There’s something in the hazy morning skies and crisp clean afternoon breeze that whispers about all the adventures that await around the riverbend.

Very few places make Moomin nostalgic for a place he’s never known.

So maybe it’s inevitable.

There’s only so long one can live amongst tales of travel and adventure without wanting one for himself.

Moomin first tries to put it into words on a fantastically sunny day. The clouds are making all sorts of shapes, so he’d brought out marmalade and a loaf of hearty bread to eat with Snufkin while cloud watching. The smell of blooming flowers hangs thick and heavy in the air with the familiar sun-warm smell of grass.

“I keep thinking about how warm the south must be,” Moomin says when the thought flits back to him.

Snufkin pauses, one hand still in the marmalade jar they’re cleaning out. 

“Oh?”

“It must be awfully warm,” Moomin begins, stars in his eyes as he paints imaginary scenes with the soft voice he only uses for deep thoughts and reading old stories discovered in the attic. “Imagine what it must be like, to stay awake all year. Folks past the mountains never hibernate.”

“They dream all the same,” Snufkin points out. Moomins hibernate when the world grows cold and soft, blanketed in snow that muffles sound. Traveling is an option rarely taken when there are dreams to be had.

But adventure runs in Moomin’s veins. He will go where he needs to.

“I know! But imagine what it must be like, to have a house with its windows open all year. To be warm and know the sun will greet you just as merrily every day…” Moomin trails off and leans back in the grass. “It must be awfully fun.”

“What brought this on?”

“I- I’m not sure. Everything, I suppose. Papa and I cleaned out his map collection yesterday. Oh, and Mama made a dinner with one of the recipes she found while she and Papa were traveling....” Moomin continues on, listing every time he’s been reminded of the wide world they live in.

Snufkin sets the jar aside and listens idly.

“It’s almost like there’s some sort of secret plan to make me travel,” Moomin finishes. “Yeah! A secret universe plan.”

“And Papa and Mama are in on it,” Snufkin guesses. 

“They are!” Moomin agrees. “How long do you think they’ve been plotting this?”

Snufkin hums a short, lilting tune as he thinks. A cloud floats high above, in the shape of either a ship or a particularly unhappy panther.

“A while, probably. Mama’s smarter than all of us.”

Moomin crosses his arms and glares up at the sky. 

He’s not pouting or sulking. 

Just... thinking.

Very seriously.

“Do you _want_ to travel?” Snufkin asks, and Moomin blinks in surprise.

_Oh._

He hadn’t considered that.

Snufkin loves Moominvalley because of the creatures who call it home. There’s a special kind of magic resting in the crest of that final hill. It shivers up his spine and fills his harmonica on the first day of spring every year, singing sweet notes and nectar-sweet melodies into the air as he returns after winter’s end. Magic is found in that moment. It’s in the way snowmelt breaks under his boots after long months alone.

He needs his space. Mumriks are solitary by nature, so trying to stay in Moominvalley year round would end badly for everyone.

Moomin is always waiting for him, no matter how long he needs.

There’s always a tale or tail around the corner, always something to do in Moominvalley. 

So Snufkin comes back every year to this precious place that may not be home in the way his tent is, but certainly is as close to a home as Snufkin can call any one place. It’s a good place to come back to.

This year, Moomin’s head is lost in the clouds a little more often than usual. He looks off to the southern mountain tops and asks about the creatures living beyond those unforgiving peaks. Snufkin tells him. It’s part of his nature.

He tells Moomin about the log cabins along the seashore and how old man Muddler traded a river crossing for a particularly nice set of buttons last year. When asked, he tells about the campfires he’s met other creatures over, and the nameless ones that did not stay unnamed. He talks about the ocean. Moomin listens with wide eyes and stores the stories away in his heart.

It’s anyone’s guess what Moomin is planning, but Snufkin suspects he’ll find out soon enough.

He gets his answers on a damp day when most beasts are indoors. The bridge’s wood is glossy from rain, marbled in mimicry of the riverbed beneath. Moomin joins him with fog clinging to his fur and determination in his eyes.

A decision has been made.

Snufkin casts his fishing line.

“I’m going south for the winter,” Moomin tells him once the silence has made itself comfortable around them.

Dread pulls at Snufkin’s chest like a dead weight. He needs those winter months to refuel and recharge. Bringing Moomin along is possible, probably, but Snufkin needs the silence in those months. Breathing is easier. Traveling together could strain the friendship they’ve built so carefully. Perhaps worst of all, there would be no joyful reunion on the first day of spring.

No magic in the rain-snow-slush and nectar-sweet-spring-tune.

No anticipation.

Snufkin keeps the promise of that day tucked away in his pockets over the lonely months. He does not want to leave Moominvalley without it.

“Don’t worry,” Moomin says, somehow picking up on the thoughts Snufkin has never been able to voice. “I know. You need your space.”

Snufkin leans close to bump their shoulders together. It never fails to amaze him how Moomin understands. Mumriks are solitary creatures. Boundaries are something Snufkin desperately needs, and crossing them would only bring trouble to everyone involved. 

“I’m sorry,” he says. 

_‘I want to go with you,’_ he means. _‘But I can’t.’_

  
  


“Oh, that sounds lovely,” Moominmama says when they tell her the news that evening. 

Snufkin has joined them for dinner, and Little My is intent on wearing as many sweaters as she can at once like an uncomfortably warm onion. Moominpapa and Moomin are helping her with the outer layers. They’re currently adding the twenty second jacket, and have graduated from Little My’s jackets, to Snufkin’s worn coats, and are now beginning to fit the layers of sleeves into Moominpapa’s old sweater. Little My’s feet no longer touch the ground, and nothing is visible from the neck of the sweater-onion but the tip of her pointed nose and very top of her hair.

Snufkin tears his eyes away from the twenty third jacket and begins chopping the carrots Moominmama had placed in front of him. “I thought you’d be more worried.”

“Never.” Moominmama tips a bowl of mushrooms into the massive pot she’s been stirring. “Our Moomintroll has a good head on his shoulders. This is just the thing to help him see that.”

Something crashes in the living room. Snufkin looks up just in time to see Little My rolling out of view. Without Moomintroll to hold her sleeve, she’s headed towards the door like a rogue winter tumbleweed full of stubborn mischief.

Their entertainment is obscured by Moomin’s arrival, though Snufkin continues watching the frantic chaos over Moomin’s shoulder. A lamp topples over.

“You _knew,”_ Moomin accuses. More breakable items crash behind him, followed by a triumphant sound from Moominpapa. Little My’s bid for freedom must have been halted.

“Nonsense,” Moominmama says with laughter in her voice. She pulls down a stack of plates. “Don’t worry about it, dear. Oh, and while you’re here- put these on the table.”

Moomin sputters in outrage and marches from the kitchen.

“How did you know he’d be going?” Snufkin asks as Moominmama turns back to the stew. It smells heavenly, with the carrots and herbs he’s always loved.

She pushes the ladle into his hand and goes to take a rosemary loaf out of the oven.

“I didn’t,” she says, and Snufkin doesn't believe it for a second.

“He was always interested in the land beyond the valley. Every time we have a visitor from beyond the mountains, it’s always Moomintroll who runs to meet them first, isn’t it?” She glances out the window to where mountains are cast in smooth, pale purple against the fading orange-pink sky. “Why?”

Snufkin shakes his head. “I was just wondering.”

“Oh. Well, I suppose in that case…” Moominmama checks that her son is busy arguing with Little My before continuing, “Our Moomintroll has always been a curious sort, hasn’t he? Always making friends. Meeting new people. He’s always had a heart too big for one valley.”

Snufkin considers that for a second, and remembers the years traveling before he’d set up camp on the riverbank. Moomintroll had hurried down to the bridge, full of questions and answers and the racing, curious thoughts all Moomintrolls have. They’d made fast friends. 

“I think I understand,” Snufkin says, and Moominmama smiles as she directs him to place silverware on the table.

  
  


“Are you sure?” Moomin asks as Mama tucks him away that evening. “About letting me go, I mean.”

“We can hardly stop you,” Mama reminds him as she draws the covers up tight. “And even if we could, I wouldn’t want to. There’s a whole world to explore beyond this valley. I got to see it. So did Papa. Now it’s your turn.”

Moomin frowns and wiggles his feet under the warm, familiar blankets he doesn’t want to leave behind. “What if I’m scared?”

“There’s nothing wrong with that.” Mama tucks the curtain further away from his window and sits on the very edge of his quilt. Outside, Moomin can still see the distant orange pinprick of Snufkin’s fire. He can’t see the stars yet, not with his lamp still on and moths beating their wings on his window screen.

He doesn't want to be scared.

“If it’s too much, and you can’t go on, come home to us,” Mama says. “Knowing your limits is important, and fear is a big part of that. But I think you’ll find that it’s much easier to walk after the first step is taken.”

Moomin frowns. “I don’t understand.”

Mama thinks for a long second. 

“I want you to be safe,” she says slowly, carefully, as if she knows how much each word will stay with him once he leaves this autumn. “But I want you to be free, too. Mostly, I'm proud of you.”

Moomin smiles. “Really?”

“Always,” Moominmama promises, and kisses him goodnight.

  
  


Moomin tells his father his plans the next day. Moominmama and Snufkin have gone on an adventure of their own - cherries and blackberries to be picked, they’d explained. Little My had gone along, and Snorkmaiden is with Too-Ticky searching for shells to make windchimes out of.

The valley is quiet, though Moomin knows slow, lazy days like these won’t really last forever, no matter how badly they want to.

“What’s this?!” Moominpapa says once Moomin has explained. “Adventure? Glorious! We shall scale the southern mountains and hike the trails of weary travelers!”

“I was thinking about going in the winter,” Moomin says. “Instead of hibernating.”

Moominpapa hops up from his desk with even more enthusiasm. “Ah, a wintertide event!”

Moomin steps out of the way as his father pulls a box from the dusty bottom shelf of his cabinet. It’s an old wooden chest, with green paint flaking away when Papa brushes the dust off.

Moomin settles down beside him and runs a curious paw over the latch.

“Let’s see,” Moominpapa says, opening the chest to reveal mementos and letters all from far-away lands. “If you’re heading down south, why not visit my old friend? He’s a capybara - one of the best, you know. We met back in my old sailing days. I was adrift, lost without a sail or sextant to guide me when we ran into each other-.”

Moomin listens to Papa recount his adventures and wonders if he’ll be lost without a ship.

He wasn’t worried at first, but now he’s beginning to realize that traveling alone is an awfully big undertaking. Usually he goes somewhere with his friends, and if anything happens they help each other. He won’t have that. Mama and Papa will hibernate. Little My never goes anywhere she does not want to, and Snufkin needs his space. Sniff refused with no hesitation, and Snorkmaiden shook her head apologetically.

He’ll be on his own.

“What’s the hardest part?” he asks when Papa pauses in describing the group of youngsters he taught how to sail. “Of adventures, I mean.”

Papa harrumphs and tucks a serious paw under his chin. “If you do it right, the point where you realize you can’t go back-”

Moomin feels as though his lungs have stopped working. 

Oh dear. 

“-That’s the hardest part. When you’re right in the thick of the storm, and waves are crashing across the deck, and oh whoops, Joxter fell overboard again after sleeping on the roof despite the lightning - _that’s_ the hardest, most miserable part imaginable.”

Distantly, Moomin wonders if it’s too late to cancel his plans. Adventure sounds downright horrifying.

“But!” Moominpapa says. “That’s also the best part. After you come home with salt in your fur, _that’s_ the memory you’ll hold most dear. So keep at it, lad. Steady as she goes.”

“And the storm?”

“It’ll pass. All of them have to, eventually.” Papa chuckles and pulls a small brass trinket from under a stack of letters. Whatever it is makes Papa’s eyes go soft in that far-away look he gets before launching into the fondest of stories.

He runs a paw over it as if stirring up the memories inside it.

“Here,” he says, taking Moomin’s paw and handing the object to him. “A lad’s first compass should be a good one, and this has led me out of more than one storm. It’s tried and true.”

“Are you sure?” Moomin asks.

“Of course,” Moominpapa says proudly. “Now, there’s a bit of a trick to compasses. They can only show you where north is. For where you _are,_ you can use a sextant. Where to _go_ is another matter entirely.”

Moomin looks down at the compass. It’s a finely crafted one, and the swinging needle has been tinted a darker red with age. He holds it steady and waits for it to find north.

“The point of adventure isn’t to find a destination,” Papa tells him as they watch the compass orient itself. “Moomins like us travel to find themselves.”

  
  


Moomin cradles the compass in his paws as he sits on the bridge beside Snufkin’s camp. Water passes slow and lazy under their feet, bobbing against Snufkin’s fishing line gently. The float is tugged this way and that by idle currents, not a fish in sight.

“I don’t want an easy adventure,” Moomin admits into the comfortable silence. “But I don’t want to be scared, either.”

Snufkin tilts his hat down and doesn't reply immediately. It’s impossible for Moomin to see his friend's expression at this angle. So he sits and waits and wonders if maybe the yellow and red-orange in the trees will go away if he wishes hard enough. Fall is here.

Moomin runs a paw over Papa’s compass and startles when Snufkin speaks.

“Fear isn’t a reason not to do something, you know. It’s alright to worry. But I think, just possibly, that the very best adventures are the ones we’re scared of.”

“I don’t think that’s quite right,” Moomin says doubtfully. “Mama says it’s important to know when things are too frightening.”

Snufkin hums in agreement as he adjusts his fishing rod. “Are they?”

Moomin looks up, a question in his eyes.

“Are they too scary?” Snufkin asks. Moomin doesn't seem to know what to think of this, so Snufkin sits back and waits in the comfortable silence. He dearly loves moments like these, when golden-warm sunlight spills across the vales and falls in dappled shadows across their bridge. The sky’s reflection flicks across the stream in flashes of blue and yellow, dancing and burbling over the riverbed.

“No,” Moomin says finally. “I don’t think so.”

Moomin skids down the hill, heedless of the rain that drums against the soil and petrichor that rises in its wake. Fallen leaves dye the grey-mist of the valley orange and red, interspersed with the distant evergreen trees that will soon be cloaked in snow.

He knew this day was coming.

He knew, and yet… he hadn’t wanted it to. Sometimes, when creatures want something hard enough, they convince themselves it’s true without actually doing anything.

“Snufkin!” Moomin calls again.

The mumrik looks up from where he’s packing up a tent, though he does not pause.

“Moomintroll,” Snufkin greets. He tightens a buckle on his pack and swings it up on one shoulder. “It’s time for me to be going.”

“Already?”

Snufkin shrugs, and the edge of his hat dips down to hide his eyes. Rainwater drips off the brim. “Creatures like me aren’t made to stay in one place forever, Moomintroll.”

Moomin shakes his head, scattering raindrops. “I know. You need your time to be alone.”

Snufkin’s mouth quirks up in a smile, and he sets his pack back down on the ground to rummage through a pocket. “Moominpapa said you were heading south and east, perhaps by sail. I found this in the mountains a few days ago.”

He gestures, so Moomin holds out cupped paws. The cloth bundle Snufkin places in them is the size of his palm, wrapped carefully in a handkerchief. He unwraps it to find a ginger root.

“It’s good for seasickness,” Snufkin tells him. He lets Moomin pull him into a hug, which for Snufkin is as good as rushing into his arms.

“Thank you,” Moomin whispers against his friend’s shoulder.

“You’ll be alright,” Snufkin promises.

Snufkin leaves to the music of rain gently blanketing this valley he calls home. Moomin wonders how it can be so easy to go without a second thought.

He will look back, he knows.

  
  


Snorkmaiden appears the next day with crossed arms and a challenge in her squared shoulders. Little My waits behind her, arms akimbo.

“Well?” Little My demands. “Are you going or not?”

Moomin begins to feel awfully unprepared for whatever trap he’s walked into. “I don’t think I was never not going?”

“Good,” Snorkmaiden decides after detangling that. “Because we’re going to help you pack.”

“...What?”

“I’m not,” Little My assures him as she marches past him to the kitchen. 

Moomin shakes his head and steps aside to let Snorkmaiden in. “You really don’t have to, you know.”

“I know,” Snorkmaiden says gently. “I’ll be worrying anyway, so let me help. Please?”

Moomin hesitates. After following Papa on the occasional vacation, he knows what he needs. He’d planned to shove camping supplies, a coat, and a sleepshirt in his old travel rucksack this evening. Maybe a bit of food as well.

“Alright,” he decides. 

Snorkmaiden squeals in delight and hurries upstairs to the attic.

“You’ll never be free of us now,” a voice says behind him. Little My wanders past him after her friend, one arm down the cookie jar she’s holding hostage. “Better bring us something good as a souvenir.”

“A souvenir?” He hadn’t considered those.

“Bring me a stick,” Little My commands. Her smile is sharp and clever before she sticks her whole head in the cookie jar to rummage around.

“A stick?” Moomin considers that. There are plenty of sticks in the valley, though he supposes that maybe being from a far off land makes even the most ordinary things exciting. Maybe. It’s still just a stick, isn’t it?

Little My pulls her head out of the cookie jar. “The very best you can find.”

“But why a _stick?”_ Moomin asks, feeling slightly incredulous and more than a little confused. He follows her up the stairs from behind. She won’t fall - mymbles have too good a balance for that - but he worries all the same when the cookie jar is larger than she is.

“I’ll figure that out when I get there.” Little My tosses another cookie in her mouth. “Ish for poking people wif,” she garbles.

“I suppose I’ll get tea or a hair ornament for Snorkmaiden,” Moomin muses. “Something strange and new for Papa, but I’ve no idea what to get Mama.”

“You’ll know it when you find it. I don’t care about fancy souvenirs, you know. I want a stick. Either that or something I’ve never heard of.”

“Like pangolin whiskers?”

“Well now I’ve heard of that,” Little My points out. “Wait until you’re adventuring to worry about gifts.”

Moomin frowns after her. “But there are so many wonderful things I want to give to everyone.”

“Well, of course there are,” Little My says as she reaches the top of the stairs and plants a hand against her hip imperiously. “But we already know about _those._ The whole point to traveling is seeing something new.”

“I don’t think that’s quite right.”

“Well, it’s why I travel. Go get your own reason, this one’s mine.”

“What do you two think you’re doing?” Snorkmaiden calls from the attic. “Come on!”

Right.

Packing.

Moomin wonders why his stomach drops at the thought as he follows Little My up the ladder.

The attic is dark and musty as always, though the banner from a recent story night is still up. Light streams in from a window he opens quickly for fresh air. The rich smell of Papa’s coffee lingers around a crate filled with discarded drafts to his manuscript detailing adventures like the one Moomin will take.

“Aha!” Snorkmaiden calls. Moomin hurries over to find her dragging a luggage chest out from under a pile of canvas tarps. “This is what you need.”

“Mountain Exploration,” Moomin reads off the side doubtfully. “I didn’t know Papa went to the peaks.”

“Bet he slid all the way down.” Little My kicks the corner. “Lot of good tugging this up a cliff would do anyone.”

Moomin rolls his eyes and sets about trying to undo the lock. It takes him five tries before admitting defeat, after which Snorkmaiden gently shoos him aside and slips a pin into it. It clicks open almost immediately. 

That’s a useful skill.

Together, they fit their paws under the lid and haul it up on a count of three.

 _“Oh,”_ Little My says as she peers in. “Now we’re talking.”

“Just wait a minute,” Snorkmaiden says as Little My jumps into the pile of firecrackers and begins rooting around for the most obnoxious and destructive choices. “We should leave a few behind. Just in case there’s a birthday or tea-party of some sort.”

“It’s okay,” Little My promises. “I can work with this.”

Moomin and Snorkmaiden exchange a wary look.

  
  


“So now we know that Little My is fire-resistant,” Snorkmaiden says as they stand on the beach together. Popping explosions herald bursts of color as the raft they made unloads itself of celebratory fireworks.

Little My snickers from where she’s lying spread-eagle on the sand. “And firecrackers make great kindling.”

“...You aren’t wrong, but that doesn't mean I think you’re quite right, either.” Moomin stares at the smoldering raft a kilometer away from shore and has to admit that perhaps things got a little out of hand. Not that it’s a surprise. Unpredictability is a staple when Little My is introduced to anything flammable, and Snorkmaiden has a cleverly hidden penchant for bossing people around. She’d taken charge and Moomin had allowed himself to hope for a voice of reason.

Alas, Snorkmaiden had critiqued the size of Little My’s raft and now they’re standing on a beach watching explosion after explosion dance across glittering waves.

With a cackle and no small amount of glee, Little My races off to cause problems, solutions, or property damage. It’s really a toss-up on which one will happen first.

Snorkmaiden sighs and sits down, patting the sand beside her. It’s an easy invitation with ember-bright light flicking across the waves and snowbell-blue sky turning pink as the horizon swallows the sun. Moomin sits with his friend in the sand and wonders what kind of sunset the mountains have.

Will it be cold and crisp, or hazy with tall stony peaks ripping the skyline apart? Logically he knows it’s the same as any other, but Moomin desperately wants a place to call home even as his bag lies half-packed in the living room. He wants to go. He wants to be home. There are so many friends to make in the world, but to do so he must leave Moominvalley behind. 

It isn’t fair.

“What do you know about the mountains beyond Moominvalley,” Moomin asks, and Snorkmaiden hums as she thinks. It’s a short, light sound. 

“They dress warmer,” Snaorkmaiden begins thoughtfully. “Up in the mountains, anyway. Be careful to bring a scarf if you climb to the top, though I can’t understand why anyone would want to.” Snorkmaiden continues, listing off whatever she can remember of the vast spaces beyond Moominvalley. Neither of them have gone a whole season’s travel away - most adventures are done by boats or camping, and always in groups. Anything else comes from Snorkmaiden’s near-encyclopedic knowledge of clouds and topography after a lifetime listening to talk of airships and meteorology. 

Snorkmaiden grew up around such maps, much in the way that Moomin himself grew up around stories. She is familiar with planning for adventures. Dangerous thrills have never interested her, but the notion of far-off lands and fanciful, elegant cities has always captured her attention.

“Be careful,” she warns him as they leave the shore that evening. “There won’t be much to do all summer without you, so you better be home on time!”

“I will,” Moomin promises, and the fact that he’ll be missed so leaves his heart yellow-warm like melted butter.

  
  
  


The day he’d decided on dawns dark and heavy with thick storm clouds weighing the horizon down like a woolen blanket. They stay inside, waiting for the rain to pass. Mama reads and knits, Papa writes, and Little My delights in hampering both of their chosen hobbies. Moomin stays by the window.

There’s no way he’s leaving today. 

The valley slopes are slick and difficult, and Snufkin always leaves with good weather at his back for luck. Moomin is taking his friend’s lead.

He checks his pack again and goes to bed with none of the jittery nerves that have been keeping him up for several sleepless nights.

The next day is _perfect._

It’s crisp and clear after the clouds have rained themselves out. The air is so sharp it cuts through his lungs like ice, but the cold can’t reach through the winter coat he’s already started to grow.

Moomin takes a deep breath and adjusts the straps of his rucksack. Mama tucks him into a hug before he can take more than a step towards the door.

“Oh, my brave little Moomintroll,” she whispers, and Moomin leans into the embrace because he knows he’ll miss it. It’s going to be a long journey, and like Papa says, all the best adventures are a little bit terrifying, but that doesn't change the fact that he’s scared. So he treasures every second.

Mama waits until he lets go, and Papa steps up next. The hug he offers is tighter, quicker, in the manner of creatures who are used to hasty farewells and travel plans dependent on a good first day’s hike south. Papa hugs Moomintroll like he has half a second to pack his pride and worry into the gesture.

“We’ll be waiting on the first day of spring,” Papa tells him when he steps back and takes Mama’s hand.

“You have your camping set,” Mama asks. 

“I do.”

“Oh, and don’t forget to keep yourself warm. Make sure you brush your teeth, and write when you can!”

“I will, I promise. Wish me luck,” he says, and they do. Voices overlap in support and Mama’s paw rests warm on his shoulder for a brief second. Papa takes his other shoulder, before both let go with something unreadable but undeniably _happy_ in their eyes.

Little My grumbles something indistinct from behind them. “All these mushy farewells and you’ll have to wade through them to reach the mountains.”

“I like mushy farewells,” Moomin says. “Where are you off to?”

“Picking berries with Sniff.” Little My hefts a basket that’s half her height and eyes Moomin suspiciously. He’s about to wish her luck when she grabs his paw and pulls him away from the porch.

“Come on,” she orders. “If you don’t take a first step, you’ll never be out of our hair.”

Moomin smiles when she darts in for a quick hug before taking off through the rain soaked grass. It turns darker where she’s brushed through the fields as dewdrops and raindrops stop reflecting the pale-grey skies.

Right.

Time to go.

Moomin takes a deep breath of the valley’s petrichor-and-wildflower air, and sets off along the path. At the treeline he allows himself one last look back to where Mama and Papa are watching.

Papa lifts his hat in a wave, and Mama follows a half-second later.

  
  
  


“Well aren’t you a sight for sore eyes,” a familiar voice exclaims, and Moomin looks up to see Too-ticky ducking out of the woods. “Heading out on an adventure, are we?”

“A good one,” Moomin tells her, willing the words to make themselves true. It’s a perfect day to start an adventure - bright autumn skies, but no chill that heralds winter’s arrival. Too-ticky adjusts a knapsack over her shoulder and falls into step beside him on the path. 

“They are if you let them be.”

“It’s funny,” Moomin says, because Too-Ticky is the kind of person it’s easy to speak to. “I thought leaving would be harder, but it’s really not so difficult at all anymore. Now all I can think of is how awfully exciting it will be to see everyone again in the spring.”

“We go so we can come back again,” Too-ticky tells him in her wise Too-ticky way.

Moomin thinks about that as chimney smoke rises up from Moominvalley behind them, marking the way home.

“We really do,” he says, and stores the words in his heart.

He’ll go.

And someday, he’ll come back again with a song in his heart and stories on his tongue.

**Author's Note:**

> written for WillowZee. Remember: we go so we can come back again.


End file.
